Book excerpt: Over the last forty years, Basil Robinson has established a reputation as a leading authority on the art of Persia. His work on Persian manuscript illumination represents one of the most important contributions made in this century to the study of the development of this pivotal branch of Islamic art, which absorbed the influence of Arab and Chinese painting, and influenced in turn the miniature painting of Mughal India. This first volume concentrates on Persian painting. Seven papers examine the general evolution of painting in Persia from the fourteenth to the nineteenth centuries, "mostly preserved in manuscript illumination, with emphasis on that most characteristic of Persian manuscripts, "the Shah-Nameh, the national epic. Particular attention is paid to the Timurid period and the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Four reviews of exhibitions of Persian art follow. Thirteen studies are devoted to a later period, the school of painting that arose under the Qajar rulers, when Persian art flourished in such new and diverse media as oil painting and painted enamels. Vol I Contents: Preface A Survey of Persian Painting 1350-1896 Persian Painting and the National Epic Persian Miniatures and Manuscripts Persian Miniatures of the 16th and 17th Centuries Shah Abbas and the Mughal Ambassador Khan Alam: the Pictorial Record Areas of Controversy in Islamic Painting Book Illustration in Transoxiana: the Timurid Period Some Modern Persian Miniatures Persian Miniatures at the British Museum Persian Painting: A Loan Exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum Persian Miniature Painting from Collections in the British Isles Qajar Art: An Introduction The Court Painters of Fath Ali Shah The Amery Collection of Persian Oil Paintings Persian Royal Portraiture and the Qajars Some Thoughts on Qajar Lacquer Qajar Lacquer Persian Lacquer in the Bern Historical Museum Persian Lacquer and the Bern Historical Museum Casket A Pair of Royal Book-Covers A Lacquer Mirror Case of 1854 Qajar Painted Enamels A Royal Qajar Enamel The Tehran Nizami of 1848 and other Qajar Illustrated Books Inde.